Astronomers in Hatfield

This week I've been attending the RAS National Astronomy Meeting (NAM) - this year held jointly with the European Astronomy Society European Week of Astronomy and Space Science giving the new meeting title of JENAM. Last year the meeting was held in Belfast (see here for my exceptionally meagre coverage of that meeting!), but this year was held at the University of Hertfordshire in Hatfield, making it a perfect opportunity for me to combine a meeting with a trip back to my home town of St. Albans (which is right next to Hatfield, although I did spend the first eighteen months of my life living in Hatfield) - this also reduced my costs as I've been staying at my parents house and they've been giving me lifts to and from the meeting [obviously I got them to drop me off far enough away from the meeting venue, so as not to embarrass me in front of my cool astronomy friends ;-)].

Last year I noticed quite a few people were blogging the meeting, but a google blog search of this year's meeting doesn't throw up much (the usual astronomy blogging force of Chris Lintott wasn't here for one), so I'll summarise a few of the highlights I saw.

As with most major meeting's I got most out of the plenary talks. On Monday we had a great talk from Richard Harrison about the STEREO mission, which involves two spacecraft - one advancing in front of Earth's orbit and one trailing it - that monitor the Sun, and the space in between the Earth and Sun, to give a unique 3D view of solar activity and coronal mass ejections (CMEs). We got some really nice videos of data from the craft showing the two opposite views of a CME heading towards the Earth, although we didn't get to see any of the 3D images of the Sun itself. For the next two sessions of the day I went learn about Supernovae and γ-ray bursts (GRBs). Avishay Gal-Yam gave a nice overview of the different types of core-collapse supernova that happen to stars over the full range of masses. These include electron capture supernova at the lowest mass end (for which there have yet to be any completely convincing observations); accretion induced collapse (AIC) supernova from two white dwarfs ripping each other apart; supernova that don't produce an observable explosion (meaning event rates could actually be higher than observed); and really massive (of hundreds of solar masses) stellar explosions, which may not even lead to a core collapse.

On Tuesday morning there were a couple of really good plenary sessions. The first was from Tim de Zeeuw from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) talking about current and future ESO plans. There were some brilliant photos of the ESO Paranal site in Chile, home of the VLT (and the building that was blown up in Quantum of Solace), and impressive information about the Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA). Most exciting was the part of the talk about the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT), a planned telescope with a 42m diameter mirror(!), which I was surprised to find out has progressed very far in the planning and design and has a fantastic science case. After that we heard from Michel Mayor, one of the original discovers of the first exoplanets, who gave a very nice talk about a load of new planets discovered using radial velocity measurements, including the lowest mass (~2 Earth masses) exoplanet yet found. Later on I found out a bit about the LOFAR radio telescope and dark matter detection experiments, but the stand out talk of the afternoon, was my talk on searching for gravitational waves form pulsars! ;-)

The first plenary talk of Wednesday was given by David Southwood, director of science for ESA. I missed the first half of this talk as I'd decided to walk from my parents house rather than get a lift and I misjudged how long it would take, but arrived to hear about Mars missions. As ever David spoke his mind and didn't hold back his opinions (which is quite refreshing from someone who has to move in the political sphere, but at times verges on just being a bit too open with his views!) Later that day I mainly heard about gravitational lensing, including a talk by John McKean (a former Glasgow graduate) about detection of a water maser at a redshift of ~2.5 - the most distant water even seen - in the lensed image of a quasar. In the afternoon I went to a session on outreach done for the International Year of Astronomy (IYA09). Particularly interesting was the planned astronomy exhibit, and associated events, at the Science museum (they apparently have a massive collection of astronomical instrumentation from over the ages, but it's mainly in storage) and the events happening at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. There was also a talk about the making of the educational film The Starry Messenger that was made by people in the astronomy group at the University of Hertfordshire - it was premiered at the meeting, but I didn't see it, although if it gets released online I may well give it a watch.

Today's plenary session saw another couple of good talks. Firstly Joseph Lazio gave a nice overview of some of the science that will be possible with the Square Kilometre Array (a future radio telescope). He couldn't touch on all the things it will do, but did give a nice little introduction into it's potential for making a pulsar timing array to detect gravitational waves (something I'm particularly interested in). I then heard the status and results of a selection of ground-based γ-ray observatories. Later I saw an interesting talk by Prof. Sir Arnold Wolfendale (he's a very prominent old astronomer and one of the founders of cosmic ray astronomy, and as he's been around so long he's not afraid to be controversial and speak his mind, although for some reason he does seem to be a global warming denier) who was discussing whether certain cosmic rays sources seen by the Pierre Auger Observatory that had been tentatively identified as correlating with AGNs, are actually extragalactic or not - his opinion, backed up with some evidence, was the latter. The final talk of the week was an invited lecture by George Ellis who was discussing current topics in cosmology. His main talking point was to say that some current trends in cosmology to talk about multiverse theories as if they are a scientifically valid position to take, as opposed to being philosophical speculation - this is due to the fact that you can't think up any experiment, or make predictions, to test these theories, so they don't stand up to a standard scientific definition. He also discussed various cosmological theories that could be tested, for example that the universe could be small and have a closed topology. Finally the meeting ended with the RAS community forum, which had some interesting discussions, but wasn't particularly controversial.

Down the Doon

[Reposted from here]

Yesterday a small group of us (Euan, Nick, Rupert and myself) took a departure from the normal north westerly or easterly river trips and went south of Glasgow into Ayrshire to paddle the River Doon (aka the Ness Glen). This river runs out of the Loch Doon dam through the Ness Glen gorge, straight over a small weir followed by a quick succession of rapid sections for about a mile.

The weather on that day was pretty overcast, but it was reasonably warm (although a bit breezy when standing by the Loch getting changed) and decent paddling weather. On heading down from the road to the river we were told by a nice old couple that the river looked "sporting", which we didn't really know what to make of, but hoped it boded well. After getting in above the weir we decided to give it a miss as there was some nasty looking metal underneath it (which from reading this has apparently taken the end off at least one boat), and started up proper just below it. It didn't take long to reach the first major rapid which we all navigated safely and were quickly onto the next. The next section saw my first swim of the day when I got pinned on a rock (which became a bit of a recurring theme for me) and the water coming over the back of my boat sent me under - I blame this on the low footbridge that I hit with my paddle just beforehand and made me lose control, but the other swims weren't so easy to pass the buck. The river was pretty shallow and narrow all the way down the gorge, so it was easy to make my way out, but my boat and paddle were a bit harder to reach and Euan bravely went in to fetch the paddle. At the next, slightly larger, rapid (I may be getting the ordering mixed up) we got out to have a look for the best route first. Then Rupert showed us the route not to take, before Nick showed a far nicer line and we followed over without any incident. Following that I had a couple more swims and pins (I had to be helped out of one pin by an old man walking by who gave me a shove with his walking stick), one of which was particularly gimpy when I just hit a log and went over, but everyone else made it down fine. This section of the river was great fun as there was always something to do and the rapids were challenging, but not too intimidating. There were a lot of low bridges, branches and obstacles to look out for, although that added a bit of character to the river.

The worst bit of the day was the next half hour (probably far longer than, but I kind of lost track of time) paddling almost flat water to the get out. I'd recommend for future trips to the Doon to get out at the bottom on the Ness Glen section and potentially just walk back to the top along the footpath, that is unless you really enjoy dull paddles, scraping your boat along shallow sections and weaving in and out of overhanging trees and bushes.

Overall it was a great trip and it's definitely a river I recommend again. Swim count: 3 (all me).

Getting shirty

For some reason today I decided to buy the new England football shirt (if you can tolerate the stupid amounts of flash used on the webpage have a look). On seeing the last couple of England matches I've rather liked the new strip (it was debuted [is that how you spell the past tense of debut? - in fact is that even how you spell debut!] on Saturday's match against Slovakia) - it's nice and simple and looks good. However, the main issue on buying it is that it costs about £50! I knew it was going to be pricey, but that was about 15 quid more than I expected. I bought it anyway and will try and get as much wear out of it as possible despite living in Scotland.

I've nothing really to add about the actual football that took place other than I'm pretty please that we're still on winning form. Saturday's friendly was a good watch despite the opposition being poor and yesterday's qualifier was reasonably dull, occasionally frustrating, but got the job done.

The real G20

This BBC article pointed out something I'd yet to notice (not that it's a particularly pertinent thing to notice) - my home postcode, G20, is the same as the name of the big meeting starting in London today between the Group of 20 top economic nations. Wow! That's such an amazing coincidence isn't it! The article throws into contrast the difference between the expected topics of discussion at the G20 meeting and the real life issues that the decent folk of Maryhill (i.e. me) are having to face on a daily basis. It's a depressing and gloomy place is Maryhill, with barely a shop left open; all of us living in boarded up, piss-stinking hi-rises; spending our lives shuffling between the bookies and the pub, with only a thin drawn-out roll-up (that has to be smoked outside in the dirty, rain sodden street) as meagre comfort; tripping over the homeless and destitute as we queue for any work we can get at the job centre; giving in to the syringe as the only release from our miserable existence; lying by the side of the road covered in vomit with a smashed bottle of Buckie and your last shred of self-worth seeping into the gutter. Compare that to the lives of these leaders of nations, with their fancy suits and cars and staff of thousands. They don't know what it's like! Damn them, damn them all.

Drumming solo

Last night I went along to A-side studios for the first time since my last band attempt (that band attempt may not fail, it's just been on the back burner while I've been busy - and too lazy to get my arse in gear and sort it out). Anyway this time I went along on my own to just go into a room and bash some drums for an hour. They've essentially turned the smallest rehearsal room into just being a drum room, mainly I think due to it really being to small to get full band in to practice (we tried it a couple of times for band practices before, but you just got deafened in there), so I was in there for an hour at the small cost of £5. One of the main reasons that I went along is that I've not played my electric kit at home recently due to fear of waking up the baby that my downstairs neighbours have, but I also wanted to get behind a real kit again as it's much better to practice on. On playing about for an hour I realised that a) I'm not very good (well I'd realised this a while ago, but it struck home again), and b) I need some structure in my practices, so I can get good. This lead me to think about getting some actual lessons where hopefully I can lose any bad drumming habits I've taught myself, learn some drills to perfect the basics and pick up some new skills. I've yet to book a lesson, but am thinking I most likely will, and I chatted to the guy who offers lessons at A-side and he seemed very nice.

Altering my experience

This morning I went to a proper tailors (well more an alteration place than tailors) for the first time ever. I wanted to get a suit jacket altered to have a more fitted look, as all the suits I've bought are off the peg things, which generally look excessively oversized and wide on me. The tailors I went to (Skint Alteration Tailors Ltd) was located in an unassuming doorway that I had to look hard to find and I had to be buzzed in and walk upstairs. Looking through their front door I could see another slightly ajar door marked staff only through which I glimpsed a couple of little old ladies at sewing machines. But I imagined this was only the tip of the iceberg and if I'd ventured into that room I would have seen a sea of blue rinses, hunched over their precious Singer's, with the deafening sound of thousands of needles punching through cloth. I didn't get to see behind that door however, so that world will remain a mystery to me. Instead I went into the reception area and was greeted by a man who was seeing to another little old lady's turn ups. The room was the only reception I've ever been in that came equipped with changing rooms, although these changing rooms weren't for the shy as the doors to them would only really have covered a standing persons midriff. Obviously my main fear, but also slight hope, was that the man who saw to my tailoring needs might be of the Suit's You Sir! variety. In fact he was almost the exact opposite, in that he got straight on the job with minimal of fuss or innuendo. I didn't even get measured and subtly felt up, which I mentally prepared myself for. He just pinned my jacket gave me a receipt and I was away. Maybe one day I'll have to venture into a more authentic tailors (one that makes entire bespoke suits, rather than just doing alterations) to get the experience I expected - on the other hand getting in and out with the minimum of fuss is not bad thing (had to get a last bit innuendo in there).

What I done

Despite doing a fair few things in the last week I've been very lax in posting about them, so I'll try to rectify that by writing something now. Previously on Cosmic Zoo you saw me flying out to Los Angeles for a collaboration meeting and doing a bit of celeb spotting in Heathrow airport, but what happened next...

My first day in LA (a week last Saturday) was my only free time before the meeting started on Sunday morning, so I met up with my friends Ben and Erin who live there. They kindly offered to show me some sites for the afternoon and evening. We started with a trip to Santa Monica, which was busy with people out shopping and visiting the pier. We headed down to the pier (which has a fun fair on it), but decided to avoid the crowds and stuck to the beach end where we had a decent fish and chips [or fish and chip - singular - as it was called] (in fact some of the best fish and chips I've had in the last year or so have been bought in the US!) and a nice afternoon beer. That evening after relaxing back at my friends flat we headed to a new caf&ecute; that one of their friends had recently opened. It was called the Golden State Café and I'd recommend it if you're in the area. The burger was really good and there were a very nice selection of local beers. Later we went to another of their friend's brothers 21st birthday up in the Hollywood Hills, which was a nice and relaxing event in a really nice place. The jet lag eventually got the better of me and I had to get a lift back to the hotel. During the whole day we apparently travelled on all four main highways that cross LA.

The rest of the week was filled with the meeting schedule, but the hotel we were at was determined to try and screw with this by providing free drinks at every opportunity. Embassy Suites hotels have a policy of free drinks receptions every evening from 5.30pm to 7.30pm (supposedly limited to 6 drinks, but this rule seemed easily circumvented - not that you needed to circumvent it as the six drinks were ample). These drinks weren't meagre measures either. I assume the policy was meant to get to too drunk to move out of the hotel and keep you spending money in their bar, and in fact it seemed to work as I barely went to anywhere else.

On the final day the meeting finished at midday, so a few of us (mainly Cardiffians) decided to head to the beach for the afternoon before catching evening flights. We went via the airport, so people could check in their bags and not have to carry them to the beach, but the main thing of note was the mode of transport we took there. We were driven there in a limo, complete with mirrored ceiling, flashy lights, and free drinks. There were 10 of us in the limo, so in fact it worked out as a cheaper option to take than the normal Super Shuttle minibus service! After the airport the limo then took us on to Venice beach (we got a couple of strange looks from people as we got out). The previous weeks weather, in Arcadia at least, had been gloriously sunny, but down at the beach it was really hazy with no sight of the sun. However, we were at the beach, and we were British, so we were going to stay there, goddamnit. The main thing that Venice Beach seems to have, other than a huge stretch of golden sand, is a very long boardwalk (without the boards) lined with shops full of tat (mainly bongs and t-shirts) and street artists/vendors. This was interesting to see, but not necessarily the sort of place you'd want to spend too much time. However, it was really good to relax on the beach for an afternoon despite it getting chilly later on and the sea being to cold to swim in (well it was possible to swim and people were doing it, but I wasn't going to give it a try).

That was all for my latest US trip. At the end I was torn between wanting to come home, but also reminded of last years excellent road trip and wanting to see some more of California. I think next year, if we're back in California in the spring, we might well have another road trip. No more celebs spotted in Heathrow on the return journey.

Sorry I couldn't inject much excitement into that recap. There is a bit more I did, but that may just have to go undocumented for now.

Arcadia

Yesterday I arrived in LA for yet another collaboration meeting. This year, unlike the same time last year, I've arrived with my luggage, which is a major improvement. The meeting isn't being held on the Caltech campus this time round and is instead in Arcadia at an Embassy Suites hotel. I'm not sure if there's actually anything to do in Arcadia, but will have to have a brief scout about this afternoon.

On an unrelated note I had a couple of celebrity spots when I was passing through Heathrow airport yesterday morning. Firstly I saw Julian Clary at the Bureau de Change, although there was little novelty to this spot as I used to see him quite a lot when I lived in a flat opposite his in Camden. The second person was former Man Utd/Denmark goalkeeping legend (and more recently BBC pundit and Strictly Come Dancing star) Peter Schmeichel. There may have been more famous people passng through, but two is a decent number to see.

Boarding in Glencoe

Yesterday I went on my first snowboarding trip in Scotland (not including the indoor slope) to a real mountain ski resort (well calling it a resort's a bit much, more like ski set-of-huts). I tagged along with a few people from the Glasgow University Surf Club, who had been planning a weekend surf trip down to Wales, but had to cancel that and instead decided to hit the slopes for the day as they still had a minibus to use. We went up to Glencoe for the day.

When we got there it was apparently a borderline decision as to whether they'd open the skilifts or not due to quite high winds. They did open up and stayed open all day despite conditions actually getting worse throughout the day. When we first got up the main chairlift to the bottom of the ski runs the weather and wind wasn't actually that bad. The was some light sleet, but it was quite bareable. The hardest thing to start off with was getting the hang of the Poma tow that takes you to the top of the beginner slope. It didn't take me as many attempts as my first ever go on a tow, but it was probably four attempts before I made it all the way up to the top (the main problem was keeping your weight over the centre of the board when the pull initially kicked in and gave you a big jolt - many people, me included, were falling off as soon as it started). I stayed on the lower slopes all day (a few other went to the top, but I didn't really feel up for it after hearing what the conditions were like up there), but they provided a good enough challenge for me to practice improving my boarding.

As it got later the rain got heavier and there were more and more parts of the slopes that were turning slushy. By the time we went down for lunch we were all soaking wet. Lunch gave us a little time to dry off and warm up, but when we went back up the rain and wind had again picked up and the bottom of the beginner slope was now more slushy mud than snow. However we persisted. I had to regain my ability to use the tow, which I'd somehow lost over lunch (this got quite frustrating and almost led me to calling it quits straight away - luckily I managed to get up the slope a bit and as soon as I was boarding again I realised that I wanted to stay on the slopes longer). Once I was able to use the tow properly again I had quite a lot of good runs down the beginner slope. The main thing I tried to get myself to do was bend my knees more - I'm generally quite upright and use my body and back foot to turn, which isn't that good and made turning quite an effort. So I took more of a crouched position, which gave me a lot more control and felt more natural. During this time I got thoroughly soaked through and the slopes became more and more slushy and cut up. Everything on me was wet and my gloves where full of water (and bits of ice) - this was fine when I was doing stuff and my body was producing heat, but it wasn't so nice when getting the chairlift down. It was very nice to change into dry clothes in the end.

Despite the weather's best attempts to make it a miserable day I actually had a great time and it was good fun to be on a real mountain slope for the first time in just under two years. I need to get out somewhere else soon.

Zoo too

Today I had my first look at Galaxy Zoo (it's been up for well over a year and I've known about it from the start, but I'm slow on the uptake sometimes) - an online project that uses the online masses (i.e. us web users) to classify galaxy images in the Sloan Digital Sky survey. Part of the reason behind the project (I think) is that people are actually rather good at image processing in a way that it's quite hard to get an automated computer program to do. So by getting people to do the classification (with multiple people classifying each galaxy for verification purposes) you get a pretty reliable and accurate catalogue - and sometimes get new things spotted. Basically what happens once you sign up is that you get shown a picture of a galaxy and then asked a couple of questions about it's morphology answerable by clicking simple icons, i.e. is it smooth and regular looking, or does it have spiral features, and that's about it - you can then move on to the next image, and the next, and the next... I only did two images on my first go and they were both fairly ordinary looking ellipticals. [ooh, I just got a spiral - there were lots more questions for that!]

One thing I have wondered about Galaxy Zoo before is whether I've inadvertantly got any hits from people who were really looking for it (with this post it'll probably become more likely). Well if you were looking for Galaxy Zoo you now have the correct link to it.

Ah, Vienna

This weekend just gone I have been having a holiday (not associated with a meeting or conference, just a regular break) in Vienna. I have a friend who lives there and decided that it would be nice to visit her and see a new city (I'd heard good things about Vienna from couple of people). I'm very glad I did have my friend there to visit, because otherwise I may have wasted the weekend due to a complete lack of preparation. I have discovered (well it was partly evident from my Caribbean holiday) that I'm not really the type who plans ahead that much, so I'm in debt to my friend who took it open herself to find things for us to do. And a good job she did to.

On Saturday (after a late brunch) we took a wander through the city centre (via the University - I'll pretty much always head to the nearest University wherever I am, I think they make me fell more comfortable), before going on a guided city tour. This started off from behind the famous Opera house and took us through the Hofburg Palace (which houses, to name one thing, the national library), then down some of the major shopping streets, and finishing at St. Stephen's Cathedral. One thing I'd also not done prior to travelling was check the weather - I'd expected it to be quite chilly, but not as cold as it actually was. The walk was very nice, but had left me lacking feeling in my toes and face, which I tried to remedy by climbing up the Cathedral Tower, but was more comprehensively dealt with when we went into a cafe for hot chocolate and cake - as we were in Vienna I had some of the famous Sachertorte. That evening, after getting ourselves properly frozen again by walking around outside (and with a brief look into one of the best known Viennese Café's - Café Central) we went for dinner. I had the biggest Schnitzel that I'd ever seen, probably about 12" in diameter, which I struggled to eat - a German guy sitting next to us told me that if I didn't finish it there would be bad weather the next day, but even with that incentive I couldn't manage the whole thing. After being so massively stuffed with food the only option was to digest the food by going to the cinema, where we saw Frost/Nixon.

On Sunday, again with no planning on my part, we had a busy schedule. First stop was the Schönbrunn Palace, which was the summer residence of the imperial family. We took a tour round the family rooms, in which I was most impressed by some of the beautiful wood panelled floor, and I also learnt a bit of history - my knowledge of the Austrian Hap/bsburgs is now greatly increased (although it started at a very low level and I hadn't even realised [or maybe very vaguely knew] that Marie Anionette was one). The snow out by the palace was quite a lot thicker than in the city centre, but we walked though it in the gardens. We headed back into the centre for our lunch of kaiserschmarrnn [corrected at the request of my friend] (a thick pancake-like thing, covered in icing sugar and served with plum jam - very tasty) before more culture in the form of an art gallery. Vienna has many, many museums and galleries, and we went in to the Leopold Museum, where there was a large exhibit of the musuems extensive Egon Schiele collection - I liked a lot of his work, but my friend was horrified to hear that I'd never heard of him before going to the musuem (this happened with a lot of the artist's she mentioned - what can I say, my knowledge of large swathes of art, history, classical music, etc, is very poor). During our time in the museum the snowfall had picked up considerably and there was a thick covering as we headed to the openair ice rink in the park in front of the Rathaus (apparently, according to our tour guide the day before, the largest outdoor rink in Europe!) It was a lovely scene seeing the rink and town hall in the snow and all lit up, and it was fun to get out on the ice (the rink had two main skating areas that were connected by an ice path through the park), but we eventually had to stop as my feet were hurting from the hired skates (I later found a very large blister on my foot!) The evening ended with what my friend told me was one of the best foods in Vienna - Käsekrainer - sausage with bits of cheese through it, served with mustard (or horseradish) and bread. I enjoyed my Käsekrainer and it was a very nice way to end the day.

I travelled home this morning (my friend even helped with this by looking up the timetable of buses to the airport for me - I am useless!) after a very nice weekend. I now have to go back there when it's a bit warmer. I also now have another airport to add to my pointless airport list :)

Plug

After my last post about science on TV I just thought I'd plug my friend Michelle's appearance on last night's episode of BBC's The One Show - she can be seen here demonstrating how science shows that you can break a plank of wood with your hand (whether she'll thank me for pointing out her appearance or not is another thing!)

Can we make... an inappropriate cut scene?

I wasn't really planning on watching tonight's episode of Horizon, but I was sat in front of the TV and it came on after MasterChef, so I stayed seated and gave it a look. Now the reason I hesitate to watch Horizon is that I (like many people I've talked to) have got more and more frustrated with it over the last few years. It's gone from a respectable science program that was informative and inspiring, without being too stuffy and impenetrable, to a gimiky show that is more about fancy computer graphics, wierd camera work, controversial titles, and very little (and also badly presented) science content - this may be just the way you have to do things in TV these days (and I probably have a rose-tinted view of some of the way it used to be - in fact I generally preferred Channel 4's Equinox), but I doesn't seem a good method to present science to the public (and actually get them to be interested and learn something) to me.

Tonight's episode was entitled "Can We Make a Star on Earth?" and was presented by Prof. Brian Cox - the BBC's current go-to guy for physics related programming (he's already got at least a couple of other Horizon's under his belt). The program was essentially about investigations into using nuclear fusion as a future power source, as well as a fair amount of the background science leading up to fusion and our energy needs. I actually was rather surprised as I thought the program was pretty good, but with some reservations. The science content of the program covered a good deal of topics at a nice level and was generally well presented. The scientists that were interviewed were well chosen and did a good job explaining and enthusing about their subject. The experiments were impressively presented and you got a good idea of the challenges that they face. So the general things that I liked about how Horizon used to be were there. The problems came when they did pieces to camera - they just didn't work or add to the program. We don't need the bizarre camera angles and weirdly positioned shots (including strange almost subliminal close-ups of his food) and cut scences. We don't need the opening minutes of random pointless musings, which almost made me switch off. When Cox was just there as a narrator, or interviewing others, all was rather good and he can do it well, but when he's on screen they decide to take it too far. In reality I don't really think Horizon requires having a presenter - a good narrator can convey all the information as well as adding awe, excitement and perspective about the science being presented.

Seeing as I know exactly how the show should be I think the BBC should ask me to take over. I'm sure it would be easy... ;)

Six Cups

Yesterday I went to the pub for a double header of sport - I was watching both the Wales v. England Six Nations Rubgy match and the Watford v. Chelsea FA Cup 5th Round match at the same time (there were side-by-side screens showing the games). Neither match went the way of my hoped for results (i.e. England and Watford wins), but they were both enjoyable nonetheless.

In the rugby the fact that England were beaten by Wales wasn't a surprising or unexpected result, but the way England played was the most surprising aspect of the match. We actually played a decent game! We played some good rugby with movement and attacking options and managed to score two rather decent tries, and if it hadn't been for giving away too many silly penalties and getting players sin binned we could have taken the game.

In the football the excitement mainly came in the form of nail-biting tension as Chelsea pummeled the Watford penalty area, but without managing to score (for the first 75 minutes at least). And then Watford got a surprise break and a goal to take the lead! We obviously got the goal too soon as we then managed to concede a hat-trick to Anelka, but it was very nice while it lasted. Chelsea deserved the win, but we at least made them work for it in the end.

Rock the boat

Today I was out on a river trip to the Lower Orchy (which was the first river I ever went out on). I didn't have to drive the club minibus this time round, which was quite nice as I could just sit back and relax in the bus for the journey. For this trip I was able to borrow a friends boat, which worked out well as it was a perfect size for me and I felt nice and stable in it. The river was good fun with some decent rapid sections that had slightly larger waves than I remembered, however the weir at the top of the run was rather smaller, and far less intimidating, than I remember from my first trip. I got down fine without any problems and wasn't close to having to swim.

Our plan after doing the Orchy was to check out the middle Etive, but this was scuppered by the car accompanying our group being involved in a slight accident (effectively shutting down the B8074). After this was dealt with we then had to give aid to some paddlers from the Edinburgh University Canoe Club, one of whom had damaged his shoulder getting out of a boat, and so we had to shuttle their driver back to her car. Further on the way home we helped out a member of the Glasgow University Mountaineering Club, who had been out for the weekend, but needed a lift back to Glasgow. These all added to a slightly more eventful trip than normal, but an enjoyable one.

Pointless airport post

This post is a rather pointless post in which I've decided to list all the airports I've been through. There's no reason to it and it's not some internet meme (which I generally dislike and ignore), it's just a list I thought I'd create (just because I occasionally like making lists - I once, many years ago, listed [in my head] all the London pubs I'd been to - maybe I'll write them down if I'm bored [I semi-joke]). Here goes:

Europe

• Glasgow International Airport (GLA)
• London Heathrow (LHR)
• London Luton (LTN)
• London Gatwick (LGW)
• London Stansted (STN)
• London City (LCY)
• Glasgow Prestwick (PIK)
• Birmingham International Airport (BHX)
• Manchester Ringway International Airport (MAN)
• Cardiff (CWL)
• East Midlands (EMA)
• Paris Charles De Gaulle (CDG)
• Amsterdam-Schipol (AMS)
• Hannover (HAJ)
• Berlin-Tegel (TXL)
• Pisa Galileo Galilei (PSA)
• Geneva (GVA)
• Palma Mallorca (PMI)
• Corfu International Airport (CFU)
• Vienna International Airport (VIE)
• Budapest (BUD)
• Munich (MUC)
• Dusseldorf International Airport (DUS)
• Southampton (SOU)
• Cork (ORK)
• Nice (NCE)
• Paris Orly (ORY)
• Rome Fiumicino (FCO)
• Faro Airport (FAO)
• Verona Airport (VRN)
• Tenerife South Airport (TFS)
• Reykjavik Airport (KEF)
• Dublin (DUB)
• Arecife, Lanzarote (ACE)
• Pula, Croatia (PUL)
• Billund, Denmark (BLL)

North America and Caribbean

• Newark (EWR)
• Boston (BOS)
• Miami (MIA)
• Los Angeles (LAX)
• San Francisco (SFO)
• Burbank (BUR)
• Phoenix (PHX)
• Baton Rouge (BTR)
• Detroit (DTW)
• Atlanta (ATL)
• Memphis (MEM)
• San Juan (SJA)
• Houston (IAH)
• Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW)
• Austin (AUS)
• Seattle-Tacoma (SEA)
• Minneapolis-St. Paul (MSP)
• New York JFK (JFK)
• Jacksonville (JAX)
• New York La Guardia (LGA)
• State College (SCE)
• Philadelphia (PHL)
• Beef Island International Airport, Tortola (EIS)
• Pasco Tri-Cities Airport (PSC)
• Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA)
• Chicago O'Hare (ORD)

Rest of the World

• Sydney (SYD)
• Melbourne (MEL)
• Brisbane (BNE)
• Singapore (SIN)
• Jakarta (CGK)
• Dubai International Airport (DXB)
• Beijing Capital International Airport (PEK)
• Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport (HGH)
• Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG)
• Hong Kong International Airport (HKG)

[I may rate each one in terms of how much it has pissed me off whilst travelling through it - I can tell you now that Newark rates high on the piss-me-off-ability scale.]

Survivor

When I arrived back yesterday I found I had a stowaway in my luggage - a cockroach had smuggled itself into one of my hoodies and made it back with me. It still seemed to be slightly alive as it was twitching a bit, but I flushed it down the toilet, so it may have died by now - it was a big bastard though and may have found a way to survive (hopefully it won't seek revenge).

In Da'House

If you are looking for a hotel in old San Juan (Puerto Rico) then I highly recommend Da'House hotel. We got taken here by a taxi driver after arriving at San Juan airport and not really knowing where to stay and just asking to be taken to a cheap hotel. The driver did very well as this place is really nice and very reasonably priced. It's in a lovely building with a great local character. It has local art on all the walls. The rooms are modern and clean. There's a roof terrace, with hottub, with views over the whole city. It has free internet and wifi. It's right in the heart of old San Juan. It's a great random find. [I should note that this place has no TV in the rooms and no restaurant or bar, but there are plenty of places to eat and drink just outside it.]

Astrophysicist of the Caribbean 2

Last Friday I embarked on the holiday part of my trip (yes, the rest of it had been purely work-based) as me and my friend (former officemate and bandmate Chris) headed off to the British Virgin Islands (BVI). [Actually the first thing we'd done on Friday (with a few others, in a hired Jeep) had in fact been to drive out to the El Yunque National Forest (still on Puerto Rico) and do a bit of hiking.]

We were going to the largest island in the BVIs - Tortola - which is only a short 30ish minute flight from Puerto Rico. The plane levels out at only 6000 feet before starting it's decent again, but this does offer some great views of the islands.

When we arrived in Tortola we got a taxi across the island to Cane Garden Bay where we we're to be staying for the weekend. The first thing I noticed when getting driven across the island was how steep the place is - the roads are at crazy angles and are far steeper that any I've seen before - but somehow our taxi made it over okay. When I got over the steepness of the roads (and the occasional cow in road) I started to notice the views (and the many chickens!), which allow you to see over large chunks of the island and some of the other islands beyond. It was a really great view when driving down into Cane Garden Bay and realising that this is where we'd be staying.

Cane Garden Bay is apparently one of the most popular locations on the island - it certainly does look very nice and has a really good beach. When you first drive through it some parts have a slightly run down look, but outside of the modern expensive resorts this was how most of the island looked (people seem to leave their houses half finished, or at least they leave them with the option of extending them a bit, so many house had piping and cabling sticking out their roofs for when they decide to build the next floor). It was in reality perfectly nice and our hotel (the Elm Beach Suites) was basic, but very nice - and most importantly pretty much on the beach. We had a relaxing first night and sat around having barbecued meat, a few beers and the local drink - the Painkiller - and the whole place was pretty quiet with a nice atmosphere.

The next day the beach by our hotel became very busy. There was a cruise ship docked in Road Town (the capital of the BVI) and large numbers of people had come through to Cane Garden Bay. This made the whole place not that nice - it was similar to any Spanish beach packed out with touring Brits (and Americans)! We sunbathed and swam in the sea for a bit, but got a taxi into Road Town for the afternoon to get away from the beach crowds. Road Town itself seemed to have nothing really going for it (and according to our taxi driver apparently on Saturdays it's quite dead!) We wandered around for a while, but couldn't find a tourist information office, or any sites to see, so we ended up just having a drink in Pusser's Pub (where we ended up watching the end of the Man U. vs. Spurs FA Cup match). Going back to Cane Garden Bay that evening it had calmed down a lot as all the cruiseship crowd had left. We had dinner in Quito's where later the local band played. The day was slightly disappointing, but our main problem was not having had any plan of what to do.

The next day we did make a plan. We decided to walk west along the coast (the less steep option) from Cane Garden Bay (on the north west of the island, but looking out more south west toward Jost van Dyke Island and the US Virgin Islands) towards the western most tip of the island and see what we could find. Our own bay was also a lot nicer due to it being empty of the cruiseship crowd. After a bit of hill negotiations getting out of the bay we eventually got into Little Apple Bay, where we saw a few people surfing (the waves were pretty small, but there was enough to catch a bit of surf). We stopped off for lunch at Sebastian's on the Beach (a hotel I'd looked at when booking, but was a bit more expensive, which did look very nice). We hired body boards and spent a couple of hours there (I did manage to get a bit of board rash from mine, but it was fun). We next carried on into the next bay, Long Bay, which contained a really nice looking long bay - this place was home to a rather fancy looking resort, which identical modern villas. We attempted to scramble around the rocky point at the end of the bay, which would have lead into Smuggler's Cove, but we didn't manage to make it all the way around due to fear of killing ourselves (there was a plaque near the point we reached commemorating someone who'd maybe been unlucky when attempting to get around) - if we'd had extra gear and more time it would probably been doable. We took the easier road option around to Smuggler's Cove and found a cool beach that seemed popular with the locals. Later (after having a rather strange vegetable/cheese pizza from a very nice woman called Annie, who made us listen to Christian ballads as we ate) we headed back to Little Apple Bay to go to Tortola's "Number 1 Party Spot", the Bomba Shack, which was a literal shack on the coast that had many pairs of pants hanging from it's ceiling. Here we met a group of American's, well mainly this guy Marcus, who we had a pleasant chat with - they we sailing the islands and off to a party on Jost Van Dyke the next day (Marcus did invite us, but we had to decline). All-in-all this was a far better day that the previous one as we'd actually done stuff and been productive.

The next day, Monday, we were leaving, but still managed to get out for a bit of sea kayaking in the morning before our flight back. On driving back to the airport the whole island looked really nice and it felt like a shame to be leaving already after only just discovering what we could do. It was also annoying that we found out that the following evening 800 blues musicians were going to be descending on Cane Garden Bay and playing on the beach!

In general I'd recommend traveling to the BVI, but do have some idea of what you want to do (unless you're happy to just lie on a beach all day). One thing we should have done is try and get on a day's sailing trip around the islands - sailing is the main thing to do there, and it looks a great place to do it. [Do also note that they charge you a $20 departure tax!]

Restaurant tip

If staying in San Juan in Puerto Rico (and you're near the hotel I've been staying at, around here) then I'd recommend checking out Cafe del Angel for some Puerto Rican cuisine. It does nice, simple, tasty food and is very friendly - some local things to try out are the fried plantain and mofongo.

The dish

Today was the last day of the meeting and involved a trip to the National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center (aka the Arecibo Observatory - or the big dish where Bond fights Trevelyan at the end of GoldenEye). Travelling there, through the rather hilly and forested terrain, we first got a glimpse of the three ~100m towers that support the receiver instruments from a few miles out. They got more and more impressive as we approach and could really start to appreciate the size of them. When there we got to walk down underneath the dish, which is a mesh of aluminium panels formed into a spherical surface and kept to an (rms) accuracy of 2mm using many metal cables under tension. I'd always been under the false impression that the dish was situated in a crater caused by a meteor strike, or an extinct volcano, but it (and the formation of the generally hilly terrian) is actually a sink hole formed from a collapsed cave system. Rather than resting on the ground the dish actually is supported around the edge and sits quite far above you - the plant and animal life still lives quite happily under there and there's plenty of room for people to wander about. After seeing the underside of the dish we went into the control room, which was quite interesting (for us astronomy types) and consisted of banks of computers and electronic equipment, but wasn't as exciting an experience as looking at the main dish (I've seen computers before). We got into the control room just before a torrential downpour, but other groups touring the telescope weren't quite as lucky and they ended up getting thouroughly soaked. After that we headed up to the main visitors centre from which you got a great view of the platform on which the antenna feeds are placed - there are two main feeds: the older line feed [the thing pointing down in the right of this picture], which sits along the focal point of the spherical dish (waves reflected from the edge of the dish get focused lower down than waves reflected from near the middle, so to get them all your antenna feed has to cover many focal distances); and the newer Gregorian dome [the domey thing in the previously linked to picture], which focuses the waves to a single point. [I may have to incorporate this, and my own photos, into my next lecture]. Unfortunately most of us didn't get to go our to the antenna array platform, which can be reached by a cable car or catwalk, due to restrictions on the number of people who can go at one time - so we didn't get to reinact any GoldenEye fight scenes. It really was a cool place to go and very impressive, so I'd recommend it to anyone visiting Puerto Rico.

I should just note that the next GWDAW meeting (GWDAW 14) is going to be hosted by the University of Rome and will take place around (I think) the 25th Jan 2010 [let's see if this post becomes the number one google hit on searches for GWDAW 14!].

Night swimming

Tonight, after the conference dinner, we indulged in a couple of activities that are only really practical in tropical seaside locations. The first was a game of beach football, which is far more knackering than regular football due to the extra effort needed to run about on sand; and is also more painful, due to having to kick a sandy ball, with sandy bare feet, leading to much loss of skin. Despite the slight pain it was good fun and we beat a team of quite competitive Italians [plus one Irish] (they may claim that they won by default as we kind of abandoned the second half, but they know that they were just outplayed by a more fit and superior team).

The second activity was swimming, both in the sea and the hotel pool. It's such a great thing to be able to jump into the water knowing you're not going to die of shock, or have your testicles retreat as deep into your body cavity as they can. The temperature is pleasant being neither too hot (although there's also a hot tub for when you do want some hot, bubbly action) or too cold. I've also discovered that I'm a better swimmer when slightly drunk (this isn't a endorsement of drinking and swimming kids - I'm sure it can also be quite dangerous) - I'm just more relaxed and don't rush my strokes, also I can hold my breath for longer without panicking.

Basically what I'm saying is that we should all live in the Caribbean, cos it's great.

It's the time, it's the place, it's the motion...

Today has been an historic day. A day that many people thought, or imagined, would never come. But the prospect of hope and change meant that anything was possible... yes, it became the day that I first played pool volleyball.

The net represented the challenges to overcome (and a literal net) and the ball (other than being a ball) was the American spirit of forging a better future from determination, hard work and high ideals - unfortunately in the game I was playing the ball didn't manage to make it over the net most of the time, but we can only hope that Obama's a better volleyball player (and President) than me and, obviously, Bush.

[As a more serious aside to this post I do hope that Obama can live up to at least part of his hype (which is obviously far too high at the moment) and restore some credibility to the US political system in the eyes of the world. I did like his specific nods towards science in his inaugaratuion speech, but other than that I would like him to live up to his promises of a transparent and open government.]

First day in the tropics

I arrived in Puerto Rico without any incident (and with my luggage), other than a 1 hour delay on our flight from Miami to San Juan. The hotel that we're staying in is pretty nice - it's the Condado Plaza Hotel, and the main thing to note, apart from the pools and casino, is that my bathroom has an entirely glass (well for three of the four walls) shower! It's all rather swish basically (and this internet connection is free with the room).

Today we (by which I mean myself and several other gravitational wave types from Glasgow and elsewhere) went for a wander into San Juan's old town. A carnival of some sort is on this weekend, so there was a fair bit of build up to that going on. Some of the streets were, I assume, more crowded that normal and there were various stages being set up. We didn't pay too much attention to this, but did wander towards the fort (Fort San Felipe del Morro) and had a good look round - it's a rather cool place to go to and is actually rather a bargin for the $3 entrance fee.

The weather so far has been mixed, but nice, with a lot of (warm) rain until about 2pm (before which it was a bit too humid) and then glorious weather after that. I would write more, but I need to go to sleep as the meeting starts in the morning...

Astrophysicists of the Caribbean

What's a nice reassuring thing that can happen the day before you get a flight? Well it's certainly not this - the link is, unsurprisingly, to the plane crash in New York today. It's obviously great news to see that everyone survived with minimal injury, but I think it's amazingly lucky and I expect the pilot deserves a great deal of credit. The current best guess as to the cause of the accident is a flock of birds getting sucked into the engine, so I just hope that large groups of birds steer clear of Glasgow, Heathrow and Miami airports tomorrow.

I should just note that the reason I'm flying tomorrow is that I'm off to GWDAW 13 - a gravitational wave meeting being held, this year, in Puerto Rico. There's ligitimate reason for it to be held in Puerto Rico (honest!) It's the home to the Arecibo radio telescope, and radio pulsar observations are one of the ways to detect gravitational waves - see that's a good reason to be there isn't it! It just so happens that I'm taking a few days holiday in the Caribbean afterwards, but that is not, I repeat not, the reason for going.

[I think maybe I should have saved the title of this post until my next one, but there were sequels to the film, so I can do sequels to this title]

Back to the chalk board

Tomorrow see's me restarting my lecture course (same one as the last two years). This year I've LaTeXed up my lecture notes (well a chunk of them so far), so that they're readable to both me and the students. Hopefully it'll be worth it! Let's bring the joys of Observational Methods to the students...

Double feature

Last weekend saw me taking two trips to the cinema, which is way more than my usual no trips. I went to see two quite different style films that I've been trying to think of similarities between, so as to make this post more interesting, but I've been struggling a bit.

The first film I saw late on Saturday night (after an aborted earlier evening effort due to rather large queues) was Role Models. This star's Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott (with Rudd playing a kind of Paul Rudd character and Scott doing an excellent job of playing Seann [why the extra n] William Scott aka Stifler) as two guys who have to do community service by being mentors for a couple of wayward kids (kind of like the "Bigger brothers" from that old episode of the Simpsons where Bart disowns Homer) - one who's a bit geky and shy and the other who's a sweary tearaway. It's not a particularly novel film and is very much in the style of other recent comedies (Knocked Up, Superbad etc), but was entertaining enough. I think Rudd (who co-wrote the film) tried to inject a few in-jokes into it, some of which were ok, but other's didn't quite work on my non-late-thirties not-American ears. I laughed a good amount of times (mainly at Bobb'e J. Thompson's character, who did very well delivering many a foul-mothed line), so I'd say the film worked overall, but isn't going to be a classic.

The next film (seen on Sunday night) took me from the afluent suburbs of the US into the poverty stricken slums of Mumbai - yes, you've guess it, I went to see Slumdog Millionaire. Is it worth it's current crop of Golden Globes? I'd have to say yes (despite having not seen the majority of the other films that were nominated - partly cos they're not released in the UK yet). The film is visually really good for a start, so just watching it is a treat. I'd say that the parts of the story that aren't flashbacks to the characters as kids aren't quite as engaging (good though they are), because the actors playing the young versions of Jamal and Salim are amazing (sorry Bobb'e J., they're better than you) and there are great moments of comedy and tragedy. As Andrew Collins says don't go to see this film as it's been marketed ("the feel-good film of the decade") as it's brutal at times, but do go and see it.

So what is there linking these films? I suppose you could say that both films show triumph over adversity for kid's who've had it hard (mind you the kids in Slumdog have it a few orders of magnitude harsher that those in Role Models), but then that's just the classic underdog does good plot of most stories. But should you want to see a classic underdog story I (and the Golden Globe voters) think Slumdog just edges it.

The draw

After our 1-0 win in the FA Cup third round against Scunthorpe (I have no idea how the game was as I missed the highlights and the BBC website has very little to say on the matter), we (Watford FC) have been drawn against the eventual winners of the replayed Leicester vs Crystal Palace match. So it'll either be a fellow Championship team we'll be up against, or Leicester who are leaders of League One, which I suppose isn't too bad, and I'm not really sure who I'd prefer. Maybe we can have a good run and emulate the (partial) successes of a couple of years back.

Desktop band

Today I started having a play around with GarageBand on my Mac. It's essentially a piece of software that allows you to create music tracks either by recording your own stuff, or piecing together the music with software instruments. I've used it a few times to just record one channel of stuff through the inbuilt microphone on my laptop, but have never tried experimenting with it as a way of putting together music. Essentially all I did today was see what all the different instruments and effects it has sound like (I did create a very short [about 15 seconds] tune with three instrumental parts, but realised that it requires a bit more than a couple of hours pissing around to put together something more layered and melodious i.e. good), but may in the future try to create something real. I say this now, but it'll probably be one of those things that never really gets off the ground - like learning the keyboard (which as it turns out would come in handy for trying to built up a track on GarageBand)!

Another music related thing is that I found what looks like a rather decent website containing free video tutorials on drumming techniques - it's called onlinedrummer.com and looks very useful from the three videos I've watched so far. Maybe my drumming could make a sudden leap from my usual rather simple beats.

Happy New year

Happy new year everyone. What did you all do to celebrate the change from 2008 to 2009?

I had a different new year location this time compared to the last three years. After spending Christmas with the folks I stayed down south rather than travelling back up to Glasgow (as I have for the last three years), so that I could go into London for the night. I didn't have much of a plan, but met up with an old university friend with the intention of finding a pub somewhere in the centre and then heading to the Thames to watch the fireworks. The first part of this plan worked and we started off in a Samuel Smiths pub called The Chandos just by Trafalgar Square - these pubs generally provide a place for a cheap beer even in central London, but they'd hiked up their prices by 1.5-2 times the regular price especially for the evening. After a few pints in there we moved on to a Pitcher and Piano pub next door which had slightly cheaper drinks, but also a slightly poorer atmosphere. We left leaving the pub a bit late to make it down to the Thames given the size of the crowds, so decided to stick around Trafalgar Square and party with the people there. Before the millenium Trafalgar Sqaure used to the the place to celebrate new year in London, but since then it seems that the banks of the Thames is the place to be, and there's actually not much in Trafalgar Square other than a big screen. At midnight we jumped around a bit and opened a rather nasty bottle of Champagne and had some very harsh tasting cigars, but everyone was having fun. We did however forget to sing Auld Lang Syne!

We followed this up with another pint, but then had a few problems. My friend who I was out with, and who I was going to be staying with, lives near Wimbledon so we left to the pub to get the tube back there. Unfortunately we got split up and decided to make our own ways back. I attempted to get into Charing Cross tube station, but they seem to have closed off all the entrances, and everyone was getting herded away from there. I decided to head north up Charing Cross Road to a station further up the Northern Line. This worked and I managed to get on a train at Goodge Street, but my friend hadn't been so lucky and was still stuck down on the Strand and had been corraled into a fenced off area by the police. I got back to my friends flat and was stuck outside for a couple of hours before he made it home. I had curled up and managed to get a bit of sleep on his doorstep, but it wasn't the most warm or comfortable time. I did have a good night, but it could have ended a bit better.

Parsnip and carrot soup

Just thought I'd make a quick note of my simple recipe for carrot & parsnip soup (it really is that simple that I should be able to remember it and anyone else would quite adequately be able to invent their own recipe, but what is the internet for if not for pointless information - plus I've posted soup recipes before, so why not continue with it - plus, plus I don't need to justify myself to myself on my own blog!)

Ingredients:

• 2 carrots
• 2 parsnips
• half onion
• 1 clove of garic
• fresh stem ginger
• 250 ml stock (I used chicken, but you could use different stock if you want)
• 125 ml single cream
• nutmeg
• lemon juice (a bit!)
  
• salt + pepper

Method:
Peel carrots and parsnips and chop into small pieces. Finely chop garlic, ginger and onion and put in saucepan. Sweat off onion, garlic and ginger in a little oil. Add carrots, parsnips and stock, and as much lemon juice, nutmeg and seasoning as your tastes require. Bring to the boil and then simmer for 20 mins(ish). Take of the hob, stir in the cream and then puree with one of those electric spinny-bladey things. Pour into bowl and eat.

The party meeting

This week sees the Christmas season really kick off with a host of festive work dos. I had my first Chrimbo party a week and a half ago with the canoe club (we went vaguely Italian with dinner at Di Maggios), but they'll be coming quick and fast over the next five days. Tuesday sees research group Xmas lunch number 1, with the IGR Spanish tapas-based bash at Cafe Andaluz. Then Thursday has an Australio-East Asian fusion style yuletide lunch at North of Bondi with the A&A group. Finally the week is rounded off with the traditional (traditionally rather poor that is - unless you really like Coronation Chicken and Caramel Shortcake) Physics and Astronomy Department party on Friday afternoon. I'm sure the meals will all be nice, but I've been slightly put out by the lack of a traditional turkey-based meal as an option at any of these events, but I'll just have to make up for that by eating as much turkey/stuffing/roast spuds/cranberry sauce/roast parsnips/pigs in blankets/etc the following week.

All that merriment is not to say no work will get done as I'm having to give a couple of talks during the week. Both of these are for our collaboration meeting which is in Maryland this week, but as you may have guessed I'm not going to be there in person (otherwise it would be rather hard to attend the lunches/parties), so these will be given by the magic of the phone (or the internet via EVO if it's being reliable enough). The main annoyance being that the talk on Wednesday will probably be at around 9.30-10.00pm.

Band attempt V

Following this post, in which I tried out with a band who I never heard back from, I (and others) have been making efforts to form a new band using members of the canoe club (which has quite a few very musical members). Four of us had our first experimental (in terms of testing out the whole band idea, rather than our musical style) jam session on Tuesday. We went to A-Side studios, which is the place that my former band(s) Corpse Full of Bees/Look Up for Danger practiced at, albeit with a name change from Practice Pad, which has been very slightly done up with the best new feature being wireless internet. Instrument-wise we had drums (obviously!), a couple of guitars, a bass, a sax and a tin-whistle (essential for all bands apparently), but with only four of us these couldn't all be played simultaneously. The session didn't have that much direction and we mainly just pissed around playing random stuff, but it was very good fun and gave us the motivation to try and continue things - we've got a version of a popular Disney cartoon theme tune that needs to be honed. The main problem for me was that of the four of us there is another Matt who is a considerably better drummer than me (and by considerably I mean at huge, fuck off, gaping chasm, better than me - he's very good and I am pretty shit), so I felt kind of intimidated and over shadowed by this, but it'll either spur me on to improve (for which I suppose I should put in a bit more practice time), or lead me into a fit of despondency. However, as one of the band's primary instigators I think I can make sure that I stay on in the role of drummer even if we could have someone far better - the other Matt also plays guitar very well, so he'd still be there. We're now just trying to recruit more of canoe club into the band, but I think it'll probably be the new year before we get another practice session in.

The decline and fall of the rolling empire

Yesterday was the last pool session of the year for the canoe club and I got to spend my usual 10-15 mins in a boat paddling around. My general paddling skills are now reasonable, but for the last couple of months my ability to roll has declined considerably. At the start of the new term I could upright myself the vast majority of times when I capsized (generally on purpose), but yesterday I managed a meager one roll for three attempts, which has been the norm for the last few weeks. I think I started to get a bit complacent and have been relying on pulling down on the paddle as leverage too much rather than using a nice strong hip-flick. This will need to be remedied come the new year

Second post...

...again by email (can you spot the theme).

I've have followed Iain in quickly setting up an account on posterous - where indeed this post can originally be found. This seems like a pretty cool site that you can, for example, submit posts by email, or text message (well if you're in the US you can, they haven't got it sorted for other countries yet), or post pretty much any other kind of online media in a very simple way. It can also automatically cross post anything on your other blogs/facebook/twitter/flikr/etc (and this post is also a kind of experiment to see if, and how quickly, the cross posting works). There's no real point in me having this new site as it'll probably just provide additional duplication of the shit I'd put online anyway - but it could provide useful for posting things on occasions when having blogger open in a browser would be frowned upon.

[Update: It worked very quickly, but the post had lots of carriage returns in it that I had to edit out manually]

Posted via email from Matt's posterous

Carling Cup exit

Watford's one chance at glory (well the FA Cup is still to come, but our league chances are shot) this season - the Carling Cup - has got away from us after losing 1-2 to Tottenham this evening. Apparently it was a reasonable performance from us and maybe something new boss Brendan "Buck" Rodgers (I'd never heard of him before - well I'd never heard of Aidy before he joined us - but apparently he was Chelsea reserve team coach) can build on.

Back on the (fake) piste

This evening I went snowboarding for the first time in just under two years. I went for a session at the indoor ski slope at SNO!zone (that's how they spell it, it's not me!) at the Xscape complex in Braehead. I wasn't particularly convinced that I'd remember how to do it and had planned to book a refresher lesson due to the standards ("You must be able to use the lifts, control your speed/direction, perform controlled linked turns and ensure your boots fit correctly") that SNO!zone expect you to be at to go on their main slope - I was particularly worried that I wouldn't be able to use the lifts (you can read about my first particularly atrocious attempts here), which would show me up as completely unsuited to the main slope straight away. But unfortunately there were no space left for a lesson, so I had no choice except to throw myself onto the mercy of the big slope. Things in fact turned out perfectly fine. The tow lifts were far easier to use that I remembered, other than being particularly uncomfortable and crotch-crushing - I didn't fall off the lift at all. On going down the slope, which was actually rather tame compared to all of the real slopes I'd been on, I still remembered how to turn from one edge to the other, control my speed and stop - so I met all the requirements with no problem! I did fall over once, but it was a minor topple. It was very good to go and remind myself how to snowboard and I'll probably go back a few times before hopefully embarking on an actual trip to some mountains early next year.

As cold as ice

Today, despite the temperature never getting above freezing, we went out on a kayak trip to the river Teith. This was a pretty tame river with no real large rapids, but given the temperature that was fine with me as it lessened the chance of me capsizing and going into the water. Getting changed into our kayaking kit and onto the river required a fair bit of will power, but we managed it. Paddling kept most of me nice and warm, but my hands were bloody freezing. All of us had ice forming on our helmets and paddles. My hands managed to get some warmth and blood back into them after about 15 minutes of paddling. We paddled for about an hour until the get out. It was a real relief to get out and warm up, but overall I had quite a fun paddle - it is nicer when it's a bit warmer though.

[PS - I apologise for the dullness of this post]

The turnaround?

With the recent spate of piracy does that mean we'll see the accompanying downturn in global temperatures?

Candle in the wind

After the loss of our manager earlier in the week it seems that Watford have also lost our lifetime president Elton John. He'd previously voiced concerns over the running of the club and mismanagement of the clubs finances and I think his leaving is a reaction to that. It's a shame to see an end to Sir Elton official association with the club as he's had good run being chairman and owner on a couple of occasions. I'm not building too good an impression of current club chairman Graham Simpson at the moment.

We've now got former player Malky MacKay as our caretaker manager, so we'll see how he does today in the game against Swansea.

Bye by-election

Following all the US election excitement of earlier in the week I thought I'd live blog the Glenrothes by-election result as it comes in - can you just feel the tension and excitement of such a historic world event! Then I thought "Nah, don't be stupid". However the current state of play looks like Labour have held the seat after earlier predictions of an SNP win. It looks like Gordon's back on the up.

[Update: I said I wouldn't live blog but I'm still up and the result is in: Labour have won with a total of 19946 votes, beating the SNP by over 6000 votes. Turnout was 52% which is down by 4% from the last general election (so the excitement over the US elections hasn't really turned around voter apathy over here then.) It was a very poor show for the Conservative and Lib Dem with only 1381 and 947 votes respectively - that really is impressively bad going, although I don't really know if either party's been campaigning very hard for this one.]

SLifer

After reading this CV post the other day I decided to get into the whole virtual world thing by signing up to Second Life. I have no idea what to use it for at the moment, but someday these kind of virtual worlds may become the normal way to access material and communicate online, so I may as well start now and get to grips with it. So far I've had a very quick walk, and fly, around the island you find yourself on when you sign up, but probably the most important thing I've done is making the jeans my avatar's wearing a little baggier. I have no idea how to use, or do, anything in the Second Life world yet, so I'll need to do a lot of exploring and testing. I won't give away my avatar's name (which is one think that you don't have complete freedom to chose) just yet as I'm not sure if I'll keep it, but when I'm comfortable with a name I'll let you know. Any other Second Lifers out there let me know.

Headless hornets

Shock news just in! Watford manager Aidy Boothroyd has left the club after three and a half year in charge (they say by mutual consent, but I expect there was a bit of pushing from the board). He's done very well for us in his time, taking us to the Premiership two seasons ago and leading us to a couple of decent cup runs, but recent form has been his downfall. Last season we were doing very well for the first half, leading the table for a while, but fell away completely at the end to only just finish in the last play-off spot. This season we've been managing to score quite a few goals, but unfortunately we've been conceding even more leaving us sitting in 21st position just above the relegation spot (although the mid-table is still pretty tightly packed, so it's not a disastrous place to be). It is, however, quite telling that we've only won 12 out of 48 league matches since last November! There's probably not much more that Aidy could do for the club, so now might well be the right time for him to move on. A new manager could give the team a bit more impetus like Tottenham over the last week (although there's an equal probability that it could fail miserably). But Aidy deserves a lot of praise for what he's done for us, so he will be missed. [It should be noted that my views may not reflect the beliefs of proper Watford supporters who follow the club more avidly than my weekly check of their results on the internet.]

Worst dressed

Last night saw one of my poorest efforts at a halloween costume. In the last few years I've put in the token effort of being a zombie/person who's been brutally attacked/someone with a case of mild radiation poisoning - this generally involved ripping up old clothes and adding fake blood and bruises. However this year, the halloween party I was going to involved a more specific theme than just your regular halloweenyness - it was a distopian future, sci-fi, cyber-noir party. Thinking up a costume required a bit more effort and couldn't really just involve ripping up some clothes. In the end I turned up to the party in what I'd been wearing for the rest of the day (see I said it was a poor, indeed non-existant, effort), but I did have some make-up. My one idea from earlier in the week had been to go as HAL 9000 (the computer from 2001: A Space Odyssey), so with my make up kit I went about trying to transform myself. I added a large red HAL-style eye to my forehead. I leave it to others to assess the effectiveness of this make-up and whether I convinced them that I was a psychotic computer, or whether I just looked like I had a very large spot on my face.

It's in his kit (that's where it is)

A couple of weeks ago saw me get behind a proper drum kit for the first time since leaving my own, beloved, drum kit in Germany. A friend of mine from canoe club and his flatmates wanted to get together for a bit of a jam session and I agreed to step in for as the session drummer (well maybe I'm over-inflating my role!) It was very good fun to play with others again and they were rather more professional than me - they had their own songs and everything. I was also rather impressed by the drum kit itself - I don't want to badmouth my aforementioned German drum kit, but after playing a proper kit again I now realise how shit it (and the cymbals it came with) actually was. I'm not sure whether I'll be playing with this group again, but I would like to get back with a decent kit again.

Big water

On Sunday I went out kayaking on my fourth river (I didn't post about my trip to the Clyde [a bit further upstream than the part that flows through Glasgow] a couple of weeks ago. It was a fairly tame bit of river, but that was fine as a way to ease back into river paddling after a summer away and even with the water being pretty flat I managed to swim!). The trip was meant to be a beginners trip (which I pretty much still consider myself as) and the plan was to go to the River Tummel. This was always going to be a more challenging river than the bit of the Clyde we'd done, but we didn't quite realise quite what the conditions were like until we arrived at the river. It was BIG. Not that surprising given the amount of rain there'd been and the fact the they were letting a lot water out the dam further up stream. It was decided that us beginners might risk dying if we paddled the Tummel, so a new plan was formulated. We back-tracked down to the Tay by Stanley where it was thought that things might be more manageable. There were loads of kayakers and canoers (spelling?) about on this bit of river - partly due to a canoe show being on in Perth, and partly down, presumably, to everywhere else being a bit to dangerous to do. The Tay was still pretty swollen, high, choppy and fast moving, but there were no major obstacles on it that were particularly hazardous, so we decided to go in. I'm still pretty unstable in a river kayak, so managed to capsize almost a soon as I got in the water, but someone was there straight away to right me again. After a bit of getting the feel of the boat and paddling around in an eddy I was more confident that things would be fine - although I still looked quite unstable. The largest thing to get over once we started downstream was a weir after which there were large waves for another fifty metres or so. I managed to negotiate all this fine and actually it's rather fun going through big waves - as long as you don't panic you can just ride the waves nice and easily. There were further bits of river with large waves, but I made it all the way to the get out without going over. It was definitely a far more fun paddle than the Clyde had been and was a good river to get some confidence up on. At some point I'll need to go on an intermediate trip, but at least one more beginnery one might still be what I'd prefer.

It's in the limbs

On watching the highlights of last night's US presidential debate one thing stood out above all others. That thing was the length of John McCain's arms! They're tiny! To hold the microphone near enough to his mouth his elbows had to be almost at shoulder level. His legs aren't much better either. When he was perched on the stool the dangled off it like a ventriloquist's dummy's legs. I'll be looking out for more disproportionate body parts next time I see him.

University for life

Two days ago saw the anniversary of me starting university, but this year is special in that it's been a whole 10 years since I entered the university system. And as you can see I've still not left. Can it really have been that long? Yes, is the answer, it really can. No wonder I feel so old compared to the fresh-faced, bright-eyed young students that I see milling around the university. But, hey, I plan to spend much longer in the loving arms of lady academia, so I'd better get used to it.

We wos robbed

This weekend saw Watford fall foul of an extremely bizarre refereeing decision. The final result of our game against Reading was 2-2, but the controversy surrounds Reading's first "goal" (and the quotation marks are very justified). Occasionally there will be times when the ball crosses the goal line, but the referee (or linesman) rules that it didn't and therefore doesn't give the goal. Sometimes the opposite happens and a ball that hasn't entirely crossed the line will be given as a goal. The common thing about both these kind of errors though is that the ball is in the mouth of the goal. What happened in the Watford game was a different kettle of fish. The ball did cross the line, but not didn't cross the line nor was it even within the goal mouth, and was in fact kept in by a Reading player, yet it was given as a goal by the linesman! There was some call for the game to be replayed, but that isn't going to happen. The only amusement I've got out of this situation is from a comments by Watford boss Aidy Boothroyd. When saying that he didn't blame Reading players for doing nothing to object to the goal he said "If someone stops you in a car park and gives you a present you don't say no do you?" Now I'd have to disagree with Aidy there. If a stranger came up to me in a car park, or most venues for that matter, and gave me a present I'd be very suspicious and rather unlikely to accept it.

Hitchhiking for cash

I just read how Eoin Colfer (the author of a series of children's books about a guy called Artemis Fowl) has been commissioned to write a new Hitchhiker's book. Now like many people the Hitchhiker's series holds a special place in my heart (to varying degrees depending on the book) and I'm not really sure that it should be added to by anyone other than Adams - and since he's dead, and a very strong atheist (so if he was in an afterlife he'd probably be a bit too embarrassed to send us back a manuscript for a new book), that doesn't seem a very likely possibility. Then again even if Adams was still around I'm not sure that even he should have carried on with the writing books in that series. Colfer himself said "My first reaction was semi-outrage that anyone should be allowed to tamper with this incredible series,". My main problem is that I just don't see the point (other than a money making ploy by the publishing company, which obviously is the main point) with someone else trying to get more out of the characters and Hitchhiker's universe. I really enjoyed the Hitchhiker's books, but I didn't continue reading them because I had a special fondness for the characters and just had to find out what happened to them next! I just liked the whole bizarre concept and thought it was very funny. Maybe I'm wrong and everyone else has a real need to know what these characters are doing now, but I don't think I do. Also as an author (which I'm patently not) I'm sure I'd rather be creating my own whole new vision, without the pressure and baggage of living up to some past expectation that carrying on a pre-established series would entail.

Conflicting information

Tomorrow I'm planning on taking a trip to Hamburg seeing as I've not been out of Hannover during my 3 months here in Germany. I wanted to see what there was to do in Hamburg, so googled "tourist information Hamburg" and on the first page of results was the Visit Sweden site! I don't know how they've managed to get their site such a high rating on a search for information about a city in an entirely different country! Anyway that site didn't really help me decide what I'm going to do, so I might just go on this bus tour instead.

One win does not a good team make

It seems like it's time for England fans to get over excited about a single good result. Yesterday we managed a rather good 4-1 win away against Croatia in the World Cup 2010 qualifying campaign. I only got to see the second half, but was actually rather impressed by our performance and the player's commitment. But, and there has to be a but here, let's not get ahead of ourselves. This results doesn't now mean that we'll walk the group and be shoe ins for qualifying. We've always known that we've got the players to do very well, but one game hasn't convinced me that they can actually keep up the team ethic that they really need to progress beyond their current level. Let's just hope that Capello can keep it up though. That said if we do make it through to the World Cup in South Africa it's going to be way to hot for us to play at all anyway!

My LHC worries

I'm concerned about the LHC? "Why?" you ask, "it's not going to destroy world." I know that, but that's not what I'm worried about. What concerns me is this photo I saw from the CERN control room. Do you see? Do you see? Their control room computers are running Windows! These people should be dab hands at using Linux and writing custom control software for it, so why have they chosen Microsoft?

But, on a more serious note well done to all the people that got the LHC up and running today. Let's hope it all carries on without any hiccups and we get the first collisions soon.

Beam me up

The LHC turns on tomorrow for its first major test run with proton's circling around one of the two rings. As there's only going to be one beam there should be actually be no collisions just yet. This is still quite exciting as it should test out a lot of the systems needed to ramp the whole thing up to a proper operational level. I don't want to pander to the sensationalist media that seems to have been getting the public unduly concerned about it destroying us all, but I do want to add another word or two as to why it won't do that - particle physicists are not maniacal Bond villians! They do not want to destroy the world or participate in its destruction through anything they do. They really like living (and skiing - CERN is pretty near the Alps you see), and anyway discovering something cool and new really isn't worth shit if you've not there to see that you've discovered it (or if you can't go skiing anymore!) If they (the thousands of physicists who've worked on the project, and even more of their colleagues at universities and labs around the world) thought there was any chance of the LHC doing anything bad then they wouldn't do it. So let me reiterate the LHC is perfectly safe and there is no chance at all of it so much as harming a fly (well a fly could get irradiated if it was stupid enough to go near the beam tube or one of the detectors while it running, but then it would be its own darn fault).

The main thing I'm worried about tomorrow is if something technical goes wrong like some of the superconducting magnets failing as that could set things back a while, and we've already been waiting ages for it to come online. But while your waiting to see if these first tests are successful and things are running smoothly you can go and play at being a particle physicist yourself here.

Hip hop don't stop

[Disclaimer: If you are offended by a fairly middle-class white man talking about breakdancing and repeatedly using the words crews (although not spelling it with a u ) and skillz then you may wish to avoid this post.]

Last night a little piece of 1980s New York came to Hannover in the form of a breakdancing competition (or battle). Not wanting to miss out probably my only chance to see Germany's top B-boy crews in action myself and a few friends went along to see it. The competition was to see who would qualify for the international Battle of the Year final to be held next month (you can also currently see a recording of the whole of last night's event at that website). Before going along we were a bit dubious about that quality of dancing that we'd be seeing (we had pictures in mind of fairly stereotypical German youth's trying in vain to spin on their heads) and also whether we'd stick out as obviously not from the German hip hop scene. Both these worries were fortunately not born out and when we arrived there was a diverse enough crowd for us to not look out of place (although jakeybob bringing along some garlic in his bag was considered a bit strange!)

The competition consisted of 12 competing crews from around the country with names like Big Bang (the local Hannoverian crew, who got a huge reception from the home crowd), Incredible Syndicate, Street Beatz, etc, each of which performed a 10 minute choreographed performance. These ranged in quality, but each crew had something original to show and generally had at least a couple of star performers who could pull off the biggest power moves. One of the most audacious moves was from one of the Berlin crews (Street Beatz I think) which had an under-10 years old looking boy who they used as a kind of skipping rope! Some teams tried to have a bit of a story in there routines, some had a few props, whilst others just tried to showcase individual skills. The teams who fared worst generally were a bit younger and didn't have anyone strong enough to pull off the major moves.

After each crew had show their skillz four semi-finalists were chosen. The semi-finals were in a proper crew face-off battle like you'd see on the mean streets of the Bronx (or in the Run DMC vs. Jason Nevins It's Like That video). This gave each crew member the chance to show off what they could do, but also gave the whole team a chance to show of some big preprepared set pieces (for example forming your crew into a cock and jizzing silly string onto the others!), with the difficultly level of the moves, and the good natured antagonism between the crews, building as the battle progressed. These were when some of the most impressive moves came out. The team that won overall were TNT who did seem to have some of the best skills, including a guy who span around on the palms of his hands (which caused something of a mini pitch/dance floor invasion from certain parts of the crowd), but were a bit too arrogant and twatish to be actually likable.

One of the most difficult things about the whole night was trying to stop myself from attempting some dancing. When the vibe's in the air it's hard not want to break into a bit of body-popping (of which there was disappointingly little from the crews) or spinning around on the floor.

The GWW

A rather bizarre paper was posted on the astro-ph arXiv today. In it (well from the abstract that I've read) the authors propose that a sufficiently advance civilisation could have the means and desire to add phase modulations to Cepheid variable stars as a way of broadcasting signals over a large distance. They suggest that we should therefore try looking for such non-natural modulations in the large collection of Cepheid observations that have been made over the past 100 years. Now I don't want to suggest that this is a silly idea, but the reason I point out this article is because I like the termed they've coined for such a civilisation of Cepheid manipulators - they call them the "star-ticklers".